GI Janes: New series from Channel 4

7 March 2016

A new three part documentary series for Channel 4 will, for the first time, follow a platoon of female recruits as they embark on their training for a career in the British Army.

As the Government gears up for their 2016 review of women in the military, GI Janes (w/t) will follow the 14 week training period of 47 women aged between 17 and 32 all of whom are being trained to survive in combat on the frontline.

The series has been filmed over 14 weeks at Pirbright Army Training Centre, the biggest training centre in the UK, hosting Phase 1 training for around 2000 new soldiers every year.

The women, who are trained in parallel with the male recruits, will be expected to become expert in weapons and fitness training, drill and exercises in the field.

Under a strict regime set by the team of instructors, the recruits will embark on a strict and steep learning curve to be transformed from a disparate group, some of whom have no experience of military life, into an efficient, hardened and fit team of soldiers.

These trainers make no allowances as, with a mixture of humour, encouragement and steeliness, they coax, inspire and push the recruits, demanding of the troop the right attitude and an enormous level of commitment to complete the course.

GI Janes offers an extraordinary insight into what it takes for a female soldier to succeed in what has traditionally been a man’s world.

Battling homesickness, injury and the physical demands of carry a full pack and rifle, the recruits will need to push themselves beyond anything they have ever done before to avoid being cut loose and sent back to civvy street.

GI Janes is made for Channel 4 by Lion TV. Directed by Alex Kohler, Executive Produced by Nick Catliff, it was commissioned for Channel 4 by Anna Miralis, Commissioning Editor of Documentaries